Tracy Beckerman: Happy Howl-o-ween

Thursday

Oct 29, 2009 at 12:01 AMOct 29, 2009 at 7:52 PM

During the month of October, I will go out of my way to avoid taking my kids into drug stores, party stores or anywhere else they sell Halloween costumes and accessories, for fear of the Halloween frenzy that will ensue. But one day, I made a critical error: I took my daughter into the pet shop.

Tracy Beckerman

During the month of October, I will go out of my way to avoid taking my kids into drug stores, party stores or anywhere else they sell Halloween costumes and accessories, for fear of the Halloween frenzy that will ensue. But one day, I made a critical error: I took my daughter into the pet shop.

“Ooh, look, Mom, dog costumes for Halloween! Can we get one for Riley?” she pleaded as she ogled the display of uber-cute canine costumes. “Then we can dress him up and take him trick-or-treating with us!”

I groaned. The last time the kids wanted to dress the dog up for Halloween, they decided he should be a mummy. They wrapped him from head to tail in toilet paper. Then he ripped it off, shredded it, and ate it. The next year they decided our retriever should be a Dalmatian. They covered him in paper spots. Which he ripped off, shredded and ate. The following year, I decided to just feed him a ream of paper and save us all the trouble.

“First of all, no. Second of all, NO,” I replied emphatically. “You know he hates to be dressed up. And besides, there’s no point in taking him trick-or-treating. I don’t think anyone will be giving out Milk Bone dog biscuits.”

She persisted, but I was adamant. Part of it had to do with saving my dog’s pride. There’s just no dignity in being a dog dressed up as Yoda or Shrek. And I am not one of those pet owners who treats their pet like a fuzzy baby. I don’t dress him in four-sleeved Burberry raincoats or Lands End argyle doggie sweaters. He doesn’t wear puppy snow booties or doggie Crocs. In fact, the closest he ever came to canine couture was when he had to wear one of those medical lampshade things around his head.

But what it really came down to was the fact that I was cheap. I just wasn’t willing to plunk down 40 bucks on a stupid dog costume.
While we waited to check out, I glanced at the display. There was actually a very impressive collection of ridiculous dog costumes, everything from Wonder Woman-dog to Darth Vadar-dog. (I kid you not.) Clearly someone was spending money on this stuff. But it wasn’t going to be me.

Then I had an idea. I realized the kids and the dog were about the same size. The dog could borrow one of the kids’ old costumes. After 13 some odd years of my kids trick-or-treating, we had enough costumes to outfit a whole kennel of dogs, much less one costume-challenged retriever.

“Just this once we’re going to dress the dog up,” I told my daughter. “But we’re not buying him a new costume. He gets a hand-me-down from you, OK?”

She looked longingly at the Wonder Woman dog costume. “Oh. … OK.”

We went home and took the trunk of old costumes down from the attic. We dug through and pulled out costumes for Harpo Marx, a Power Ranger, Dorothy from “The Wizard of Oz,” Little Orphan Annie, Harry Potter, a witch, a ninja, a devil, and Cher (OK, I admit that was mine).

We rejected anything with a wig, glasses or a broomstick. We decided costumes that required the use of opposable thumbs wouldn’t work, and discarded anything that could be tripped over, tangled in, or peed on. We were left with the devil.

“This is perfect, Mom,” my daughter exclaimed. “Riley can be a Devil Dog! Get it, Devil Dog! Just like the snack!”

Which actually made perfect sense when he ripped it off, shredded it and ate it.

Tracy’s book, “Rebel without a Minivan,” is available through Amazon and other online booksellers.